Cultural Impact in Community Linguistics

Hali Dardar

Linguists and community activists approach language revitalization with various skills and aspirations. Linguists often approach language efforts to develop linguistic data, while community members often approach language as an outcropping of a larger cultural movement. As the two fields intersect, it becomes relevant to broaden the perspective of linguistic documentation in order for both parties to better impact the communities they serve.

This workshop aims to infuse methods of cultural revitalization into linguistic documentation practices. The goal of this workshop is to aid linguists in creating mutually beneficial objectives during linguistic documentation, and empower community members to facilitate cultural growth through language.

The class will present theories in cultural participation, communication, and community preservation. The presentation will lead to a discussion of how these three fields can be related to experiences in linguistic documentation. The workshop includes applied activities where participants will discuss their projects, and develop a document outlining their communities cultural revitalization community needs, and provide feedback on ways to impact community goals. Participants will leave the workshop with a deeper understanding of language as a cultural artifact, and group feedback on developing relevant research and revitalization projects.

This class targets an audience involved with language documentation with beginner to intermediate understanding of cultural participation. This audience includes community activists interested in better defining language efforts, professional linguists interested in developing symbiotic research methods, and students interested in gaining a larger perspective on the impact of language on a community.